Search Results - Semiosis

Peirce was interested primarily in logic, while Saussure was interested primarily in linguistics, which examines the functions and structures of language. But both of them recognised that there is more to significant representation than language in the narrow sense of speech and writing alone. So they developed the idea of semiosis to relate language to other sign systems both human and nonhuman. Today, there is disagreement as to the operating cause and effect. One school of thought argues that language is the semiotic prototype and its study illuminates principles that can be applied to other sign systems. The opposing school argues that there is a metasign system and that language is simply one of many codes for communicating meaning, citing the way in which human infants learn about their environment before they have acquired language. Whichever may be right, a preliminary definition of semiosis is any action or influence for communicating meaning by establishing relationships between signs which are to be interpreted by an audience.

Semiosis is the performance element involving signs. Although a human can communicate many things unintentionally, individuals usually speak or write to elicit some kind of response. Yet there is little real explanation of how semiosis produces its effects which is odd given that the word "sign" is in everyday use and most people would understand what it means. But semiotics has not offered clear technical definitions, nor is there agreement about how signs should be classified. So what, if anything, can be said with certainty?

As an insect or animal, human or otherwise, moves through its environment (sometimes termed the Umwelt), all the senses collect data which are made available to the brain. However, to prevent sensory overload, only salient data will receive the full attention of the cognitive elements of the mind. This indicates that a part of the process must be controlled by a model of the real world capable of ranking data elements in terms of their significance and filtering out the data irrelevant to survival. A sign cannot function until the audience distinguishes it from the background noise. It then triggers cognitive activity to interpret the data input and so convert it into meaningful information. This would suggest that, in the semiosphere, the process of semiosis goes through the following cycle